SIR FRANCIS DRAKE'S ANCHORAGE
BY
EDWARD L. BERTHOUD
The Elizabethan era was the dawn of the birth of the supremacy
of the English navy, which was destined in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries to sweep the seas of Spanish, Dutch and
French navies and destroy the commercial monopoly of Spain
in the new world.
Foremost among the English to attack the attempted monopoly
of Spain in the Americas and the East Indies were Drake and
Cavendish, who, with what today seem ridiculously insufficient
armaments, shook Spanish pride and conceit, and captured the
fabulous wealth they yearly sent in galleons to the mother
country.
In 1577, under the auspices of England's queen, a silent partner
and sharer in the expected booty, Sir Francis Drake sailed from
England to raid the Spanish colonies of North and South
America.
Sir Francis Drake was one of the boldest buccaneers and navi
gators that ever sailed from England; he was every inch a sailor.
Of infinite bravery, skill and self-reliance, he sallied out to shear
the golden fleece so long the sole monopoly of Spain.
Judged today by the standard of present accepted morality,
Drake's naval campaign was but a shade above piracy. It was
conquest and plunder, with no pretension to discovery or com
merce. What it achieved was merely incidental in his plans of
occupation-a mingling of chivalric bravery with a modicum
of religious fervor. One Fletcher, a clergyman, was his chaplain
and exhorter, but was not a very zealous workman in the vine
yard of the Lord. Fletcher and one Pretty have both left an
elaborate account of Drake's " res geste," which in main facts
correspond tolerably well.
Sir Francis Drake (whom Fletcher calls our Admiral), having
raided and plundered the west coast of South America and of
(208)